Do your thing, Kyle, but please stay connected to us if you can. She wanted to make certain the owl was safe at all times.
8
Jonas was amazed at how much information could be relayed when one spoke telepathically rather than aloud. He always had been. It was one of the reasons the team members had become so tightly knit. They learned so much about one another’s true characters. You couldn’t hide who you were when you spoke telepathically. Your mind was open and others could see you.
He had known Kyle Forbes for quite a few years. Jonas knew him to be a compassionate, caring doctor, an anesthesiologist, one able to get a vein on a patient when no one else could find one. He had many enhancements, most of which he didn’t talk about. He stayed quiet for the most part but always carried his share of the workload.
Jonas knew Kyle had demons; they all did. He was enormously strong, and that strength had to come from somewhere. He was a genius with explosives, taking apart and putting together bombs faster than anyone Jonas had ever seen. He had a talent for finding bombs, just knowing instinctively where they were. Like Jonas had the early warning system and no one questioned him, no one asked Kyle how he knew where the explosives were located, but they always believed him.
Never once had Kyle mentioned that he could access an animal’s vision. Or a bird’s. It was cool, but it was also a little freaky. Jonas remained very still, hunkering down in the grass, his back to Camellia’s, waiting while Kyle silently seemed to connect with the Great Gray owl. Jeff prowled along their back trail, ensuring no one was coming up behind them, although Jonas was pretty certain Camellia had her wolves watching their backs.
The owl suddenly rose into the sky, using those slow, gentle beats of its wings, looking for all the world as if it were moving leisurely just a few feet from the ground, hunting for food. Then the bird was rising into the air, not by very much, maintaining the lower altitude but now winging its way toward the ridge.
Jonas immediately felt Camellia concentrating on the network running below the ground. He tried to puzzle out what she was doing. He knew the mushrooms above ground were the fruit, and below were the roots stretching from tree to tree, a great network much like a data network. He tried to see it that way. What message was she sending—or trying to send?
What are you doing? How can I help? He didn’t want her to shut him out. He knew she was trying to do that, to use the opportunity to move away from him. To go back to doing things on her own. She’d made up her mind they couldn’t have a future together. She didn’t trust their instant connection. He shouldn’t either. The difference was he straight up didn’t care if Whitney had set some kind of trap. He believed Camellia and he could outwit the man if they stayed together.
She looked over her shoulder at him. Her blue eyes struck him again. Those jewel-toned eyes that were so blue they appeared a startling royal color.
I’m connecting with the mycelium network and asking it to bump the temperature of the ground up just a degree or two. There’s compost in the ground above and below it, so it’s easy enough to do. Once there’s a temperature change even by a degree or two, I can bring in mist. It will be dawn soon. I don’t want the owls to be spotted. They do hunt in the early morning hours, so it wouldn’t be unusual if someone did spot them, except that this isn’t their usual territory.
She thought she was chattering too much, that Jonas didn’t need the entire explanation. It was guilt and deflection. Connected to her the way he was, Jonas found her thoughts all too easy to decipher. She didn’t want to feel guilty, but she did. She didn’t consider herself his partner, even though he’d made it clear to her that he was hers. Still, though she couldn’t say it out loud, Camellia believed that if it came down to Ryland giving him an order to bring her in, Jonas would obey him.
Negative thoughts aren’t going to help us, Camellia. Right now, we’re in this together. We have to focus on the enemy. Tell me how to bring up the temperature.
He wasn’t going to get into an argument with her. She had every right to be distrustful. The truth was, he didn’t know what he’d do if Ryland gave him any kind of an order. He did know he wasn’t a man to go AWOL, not without a very good reason, and if she ran, the only way to go with her would be to do just that.